Here's a unique way to use Safari's web clip feature to create your own widget. I set up a countdown timer and generated the HTML, using this countdown generator. I then copied the HTML source, pasted it into TextEdit, added <html><head></head><body> at the top, and </body></html> at the bottom, and saved it to the Desktop as an HTML file.

Then I opened it in Safari, and used Web Clip to make my own widget from the output. Bingo -- a customised widget!

[robg adds: The theory here is more interesting than the actual example of a countdown widget, given the number of such widgets that are already available. Basically, grab an HTML snippet from a page that generates such things, add the basic HTML tags around it, then create a widget from the output.]

In fact, the actual example of a countdown widget here is more interesting than the theory, since the latter has been demonstrated countless times since the Leopard preview last summer and therefore is not a hint.

The 'theory' has some merit. The webclip demonstrations, AFAIK, have hitherto only been shown using live, online webpages, not locally stored html files, which I think is the simple point Rob (and the OP) is endeavoring to make.

So, to reiterate the value of this theory/hint; In addition to creating webclip widgets from an online website, as demonstrated many times since Leopard's unveiling, you can also create or acquire scripts & code snippets, wrap them in html tags, store them locally, load them up in Safari, then quickly & easily create widgets from them using webclip - all without having to delve into Dashcode to create a widget from scratch.

Certainly, this is probably pretty obvious to some people, yet it's not something that ever really crossed my mind.

Back to the actual hint, it is worth noting that you must retain the source files for your widget to function. That is, you cannot make your source file, create a webclip widget from it, then trash the source. Webclip does not embed the source code into a newly created widget, it merely acts as a miniature browser window. Again, probably obvious, but a worthy disclaimer.